Ex-president Park Geun-hye boycotts final court session

SEOUL -- South Korea's ousted ex-president Park Geun-hye boycotted a final court session on Friday in protest at the live broadcast of her sentencing about her role in a corruption scandal that sparked massive candle-lit protests.

The Seoul Central District Court said it has received Park's written statement that she would not turn up. The disgraced former leader argued that full live TV coverage is an infringement of her rights, but the court rejected her request. Park started boycotting hearings on October 16 last year in protest at her extended detention.​

Prosecutors demanded a 30-year jail term for Park on charges of abusing her power and conspiring with her jailed crony, Choi Soon-sil, to extort money from top conglomerates in return for business favors, coupled with a fine of 118.5 billion won (110.9 million US dollars).

Park, 66, was accused of undermining the value of the constitution by privatizing the president's authority. Prosecutors also slammed her for betraying the confidence of voters with collusive ties with businessmen, providing protection for the illegal activity of her crony and allowing her to step in state affairs.

She was ousted after the constitutional court upheld her impeachment on March 10 last year and indicted for abusing her status and power to coerce businessmen to donate money to nonprofit foundations controlled by Choi in return for business favors. The ex-president denied charges of bribery, abuse of authority, coercion and leaking government secrets.

Park was additionally indicted for accepting some 3.65 billion won from the National Intelligence Service (NIS) between May 2013 and July 2016. Prosecutors claimed the NIS fund was used for private purposes.

Choi was arrested in November 2016 and indicted for meddling in state affairs, siphoning off money from two public foundations created with cash donations from dozens of conglomerates. She received a 20-year jail sentence on charges of causing a state crisis by abusing power and controlling government affairs arbitrarily for her personal interests.